- Iraq: Regime troops fully take over key base following US withdrawal
Source: ABC News
“U.S. forces have fully withdrawn from an air base in western Iraq in implementation of an agreement with the Iraqi government, Iraqi officials said Saturday. Washington and Baghdad agreed in 2024 to wind down a U.S.-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group in Iraq by September 2025, with U.S. forces departing bases where they had been stationed. However, a small unit of U.S. military advisers and support personnel remained. … Now all U.S. personnel have departed.” (01/17/26)
- Federal judge restricts ICE gang violence in Minnesota
Source: United Press International
“Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and others cannot use ‘crowd dispersal tools’ against nonviolent protesters while enforcing federal immigration laws, a federal judge ruled on Friday. U.S. District Court of Minnesota Judge Katherine Menendez said ICE officers cannot use tear gas, pepper spray and other commonly used devices to disperse protesters who are ‘engaging in peaceful and unobstructive protest activity,’ The New York Times reported. … The lawsuit was filed three weeks before the [murder] of Renee Good, 37, in Minneapolis on Jan. 13, whom an ICE [thug] shot and killed … while she was trying to flee a pending [abduction] for obstructing ICE [thugs].” (01/17/26)
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2026/01/17/ice-minnesota-ruling/8691768678870/
- Trump announces new taxes on Americans in Greenland tantrum
Source: Politico
“President Donald Trump on Saturday said he is levying sanctions against [American buyers of goods from] eight of America’s closest European allies as he escalates his campaign to acquire Greenland from Denmark. Trump announced tariffs scheduled for February against [American buyers of goods from] the likes of the United Kingdom, France and Germany ‘until such time as a Deal is reached for the Complete and Total purchase’ of the island, which he says is critical for American defense. … In recent days, Europe has responded to Trump’s pressure by sending troops from Sweden, Norway, Germany, Finland, France, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands for military training exercises in Greenland. It’s a bid to show the White House that NATO can stave off threats from Russia and China in the Arctic — without the U.S. taking control.” (01/17/26)
https://www.politico.com/news/2026/01/17/trump-tariffs-europe-greenland-00735582
- Uganda: Museveni to get seventh terms as opponent condemns “fake results”
Source: The Guardian [UK]
“Yoweri Museveni, has won the Ugandan election and his seventh term with more than 70% of the vote, state election authorities have said, amid an internet shutdown and claims of fraud by his opponent. His opponent, a youthful musician known as Bobi Wine, condemned what he called ‘fake results’ and alleged that members of polling staff were kidnapped, among other election irregularities. He called for peaceful protests to pressure the authorities to release what he called the ‘rightful results.’ Wine also alleged that he fled his home to escape arrest by security forces who raided his house on Friday, with his political party claiming earlier that he had been taken from his home in an army helicopter.” (01/17/26)
- CA: Homeowner shoots intruder during attempted robbery, police say
Source: Yahoo! News
“A Redlands man was arrested late Thursday after police say he broke into a home, pointed a shotgun at the resident and was then shot by the homeowner. The Redlands Police Department responded to a report of shots fired shortly before midnight on Jan. 15. The homeowner arrived home and found the intruder inside. He armed himself with a handgun before confronting the intruder, who pointed a shotgun at the homeowner, according to police. That’s when the homeowner shot the intruder and immediately exited the home to call police, officials said. When officers arrived, they cleared the home and followed a blood trail that led to the back yard where they found the intruder suffering from a gunshot wound.” (01/17/26)
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/homeowner-shoots-intruder-during-attempted-024846673.html
- From Inmost to Outmost: Consciousness and the Path to Liberty
Source: Mindset Shifts
by Barry Brownstein“Rather than a triumph of strength, collectivism is a symptom of a ‘primitive consciousness’ and is ultimately doomed to fail.” (01/17/26)
https://mindsetshifts.substack.com/p/from-inmost-to-outmost-consciousness
- Recipe vs. Result: Does the US Government Actually Exist?
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp“Does the US government, as described in the US Constitution, even exist? I say it doesn’t, and as evidence for my claim, I’m going to talk about recipes. That, you see, is what a constitution is: A recipe for government. It’s made of ingredients, instructions, and warnings. Ingredients for sugar cookies: 1 cup of butter, 2/3 cup of granulated sugar, and 2 cups of flour. Instructions: Mix the ingredients, form into individual cookies, bake at 325 degrees for 15 minutes. Cool/rest for 15 minutes. Warnings: Don’t over-bake! Don’t skip the cooling time! If I use vinegar instead of butter, salt instead of sugar, and garlic powder instead of flour, bake it as a whole mass for an hour at 450 degrees, then immediately serve it, I made something. But I think you’ll agree that what I made was NOT a batch of sugar cookies. … A recipe is powerless to prevent incompetent or mischievous cooks from ruining the dish.” (01/17/26)
- Congress Wants To Hand Your Parenting to Big Tech
Source: Electronic Frontier Foundation
by Joe Mullin“Lawmakers in Washington are once again focusing on kids, screens, and mental health. But according to Congress, Big Tech is somehow both the problem and the solution. … At the center of the debate is a bill from Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Brian Schatz (D-HI) called the Kids Off Social Media Act (KOSMA), which they say will protect children and ’empower parents.’ … But while the bill’s press release contains soothing language, KOSMA doesn’t actually give parents more control. Instead of respecting how most parents guide their kids towards healthy and educational content, KOSMA hands the control panel to Big Tech. That’s right—this bill would take power away from parents, and hand it over to the companies that lawmakers say are the problem.” (01/16/26)
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/01/congress-wants-hand-your-parenting-big-tech
- What Tyranny Looks Like Now: No Crowns, No Coups Just Unchecked Power
Source: CounterPunch
by John W Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead“In January 1776, Thomas Paine published Common Sense, a pamphlet that gave voice to the discontent of a nation struggling to free itself from a tyrannical ruler who believed power flowed from his own will rather than the consent of the governed. Paine’s warning was not theoretical. Two hundred and fifty years later, we find ourselves confronting the same dilemma — this time from inside the White House.” (01/16/26)
- The Campaign to Destroy Renee Good
Source: Wired
by Parker Molloy“After George Floyd’s murder at the hands of police in 2020, right-wing media circulated his criminal history and toxicology report to argue he was no martyr. After Trayvon Martin’s death in 2012, they fixated on his hoodie and his school suspension. With Good, gender and sexuality have replaced race, but it’s the same takeaway: They weren’t innocent enough to mourn.” (01/16/26)
- Writs, Riots, and Redcoats: Hancock’s Spark of the Revolution
Source: Tenth Amendment Center
by Mike Maharrey“In an early confrontation between the customs officials and John Hancock, the British hoped that flexing their muscles would teach the colonists a lesson and cow them into submission. They were wrong. Instead, the crackdown sparked a willingness to physically resist unconstitutional taxation and British assertions of ‘unlimited’ power.” (01/17/26)
- “Heritage Americans” Want to Make Citizenship About Blood
Source: Persuasion
by Sam Kahn“Over the course of the past year, the ‘Heritage American’ movement — something I’d never come across before — moved out of the fringe and into the MAGA core, driving the rhetoric of Trump administration agencies. The ‘coming-out moment’ for Heritage Americanism may well have been JD Vance’s speech at the Claremont Institute in July 2025, in which he said: ‘America is not just an idea. We’re a particular place with a particular people and a particular set of beliefs and way of life.’ … Which ‘particular people?’ The answer may be supplied by the ‘Heritage American’ movement that centers itself on American Reformer Magazine and a group of intellectuals including C. Jay Engel, Auron MacIntyre, and Ben Crenshaw, who write lucidly, if not always with perfect logical consistency, about what they have in mind.” (01/16/26)
https://www.persuasion.community/p/its-not-my-heritage-that-makes-me
- Venezuela: The US Should Work with Machado on a Transition
Source: Cato Institute
by Ian Vásquez“Trump has also said that the U.S. would work toward a transition, though no timeline was specified, and that until then, it would work with the regime.” (01/16/26)
https://www.cato.org/commentary/venezuela-us-should-work-machado-transition
- Exhaustion Is (Still) the Strategy
Source: The Dispatch
by Kevin D Williamson“Once a week, the Trump administration does something that would get an ordinary president impeached in sane times: cooking up a ridiculously pretextual criminal investigation to try to bully the Fed chairman into cutting interest rates leaps to mind, as does murdering scores of seafaring South Americans on similarly thin pretexts. Consider the fact — which would be unbelievable in normal times — that NATO countries are sending troops to Greenland because NATO — a U.S.-led alliance — is worried that the United States is about to carry out an act of war against Denmark. … Trump’s amorality and ruthlessness, and those of his underlings, are constrained by one thing and one thing alone, and it is not the noodly spines of such specimens as Mike Pence: It is their incompetence — their horrifying, hilarious incompetence.” (01/16/26)
- Congressional Republicans might finally jump off the hamster wheel
Source: Washington Post
by George F Will“The 19th-century cartoonist Thomas Nast made the elephant the Republican Party’s symbol, but today the hamster would be more suitable for congressional Republicans. The phrase ‘hamster wheel’ is an American idiom for energy expended pointlessly. Now, however, some of those Republicans might have managed to reach a destination: exasperation with their role as ratifiers of presidential whims. Perhaps Donald Trump has at last gone too far for those legislators weary of going nowhere. He wants to prosecute Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell, his pretext being cost overruns on the remodeling of the Federal Reserve’s headquarters. This is one of Trump’s especially pointless tantrums, given that Powell’s term as chair ends May 15. Trump has, however, clarified the debate about the Fed’s ‘independence.’ And he has perhaps finally provoked a Republican recoil against his ambitions to control everything, including interest rates.” (01/16/26)
- What is Competition?
Source: EconLog
by David Hebert“Economists extol the importance of competition in markets for driving prices down and quality up. But what is ‘competition’ and how does it actually work? To non-economists, the word conjures the idea of something like a sporting contest, where there can be one winner while everyone else loses. But this comparison fails on at least two dimensions.” (01/16/26)
- Neither the ayatollah nor the shah
Source: spiked
by Étienne Vérité“The Pahlavi dynasty laid the groundwork for the authoritarian rule that Iranians are rising up against.” (01/16/26)
https://www.spiked-online.com/2026/01/16/neither-the-ayatollah-nor-the-shah/
- The Public School Shell Game Makes Phantom Daycares Look Tiny
Source: The Daily Economy
by Corey A DeAngelis“Adults siphon off taxpayer money earmarked for kids, and no one is held accountable. Teachers’ unions share the same dysfunctional incentives as headline-grabbing fraudsters in Minnesota.” (01/16/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/the-public-school-shell-game/
- Republicans now embrace “seamless garment” of statism
Source: Orange County Register
by Steven Greenhut“Based on the troubling goings-on in Minneapolis, it’s hard to describe former GOP Rep. Justin Amash’s post on X as hyperbolic: ‘They’re building a police state right before our eyes — which will ultimately be deployed against conservative Christians and gun owners and those who refuse the jab — and a lot of ‘Republicans’ with Gadsden flags in their bios are like, ‘Yeah, FAFO!’’ There’s no hope for anyone cheering, but ‘responsible’ conservatives have a rationale for defending these actions: It’s better than having Democrats in charge. Had, say, Kamala Harris won the presidency, she would have imposed socialistic policies, they say. That’s probably true, but have you noticed the latest policy plans from Donald Trump? His economic proposals echo the Democratic platform.” (01/16/26)
- Artificial Intelligence in the United States
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Kevin T Frazier“President Donald Trump’s executive order on artificial intelligence invites analysis of a question so complex that it rarely gets asked: ‘What exactly do states have the authority to regulate?’ The current, somewhat trite answer is, ‘The residuary powers reserved under the Tenth Amendment.’ Omitting the legalese, that means that states can do whatever the federal government cannot. States have the power to look out for the health, safety, and welfare of their residents. Thus, for instance, they have the power to address local concerns through zoning laws, professional certifications via licensing regimes, and ensure public safety through law enforcement. These authorities make up what’s often referred to as a state’s ‘police powers.’ While this generic reading of state power is not necessarily wrong, it’s imprecise.” (01/16/26)
https://fee.org/articles/artificial-intelligence-in-the-united-states/
- Hating X: The Naked Truth
Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob“Why do so many U.S. Democrats, like some Europeans, want to outlaw X? The current stage of the U.S. assault on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter takes the form of senatorial demands that X be removed from iOS and Android app stores. Why the enmity? Well, under the ownership of Elon Musk, X lets people say and write stuff that Democrats dislike.” (01/16/26)
- Venezuela — the Petroleum Fortress: Power, Profits, and the Dismantling of a Nation
Source: Antiwar.com
by Michael Holmes“The history of Venezuela is often reduced to a cautionary tale of a single charismatic leader or a sudden economic collapse, yet the reality is a far more harrowing chronicle of structural extraction and imperial oversight. For over a century, the nation has served as a primary laboratory for a specific kind of Western imperialism – one where the democratic aspirations of a people are routinely sacrificed at the altar of energy security and corporate profit. In his meticulously researched volume, Venezuela: What Everyone Needs to Know, the author provides an evidentiary excavation of this history, revealing how the machinery of international finance and foreign military attaches have historically dictated the boundaries of Venezuelan sovereignty.” (01/16/26)
- Greenlanders Don’t Consent To Becoming Americans
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille“According to President Donald Trump, taking possession of Greenland is a national security necessity. It’s so critical, he claims, that he’s willing to take the chilly island the ‘easy way’ or the ‘hard way.’ Denmark, which governs Greenland, isn’t eager to surrender the territory. Even more important, the residents of Greenland, most of whom don’t especially want to be Danish, have even less interest in becoming American. The leader of a country founded on high-minded sentiments about the ‘consent of the governed’ should consider taking that into account.” (01/16/25)
https://reason.com/2026/01/16/greenlanders-dont-consent-to-becoming-americans/
- The Limits of the Hamilton-Jefferson Paradigm
Source: Law & Liberty
by Michael Federici“The legacies of Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson have had an oversized influence on American political history. As important as their individual and distinct contributions to the formation of the American political order have been, their rivalry has had a lasting effect on American political thinking and conduct. In The Pursuit of Liberty: How Hamilton vs. Jefferson Ignited the Lasting Battle Over Power in America, Jeffrey Rosen argues that American political history can be understood as a continued tension between Hamiltonian and Jeffersonian ideas. Rosen does not take sides in this ideological competition; his greater concern is how it has served the health of the American regime.” (01/16/25)
https://lawliberty.org/book-review/the-limits-of-the-hamilton-jefferson-paradigm/
- The Trumpian ICE Age: The Frigidity of Collectivism
Source: Free Association
by Sheldon Richman“Welcome to the Trumpian ICE Age, a vivid lesson in the frigidity of collectivism. Take note, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Compared to Trump, you’re a piker.” (01/16/26)
https://sheldonfreeassociation.blogspot.com/2026/01/tgif-trumpian-ice-age-frigidity-of.html
- Russia Won’t Have to Say No: Europe Will
Source: The American Conservative
by Ted Snider“merican negotiators have been negotiating on separate tracks with Ukraine and Russia in the hope that those two tracks will eventually converge. Despite President Donald Trump’s recent statement that the two sides are ‘maybe very close’ to a deal, and the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky’s evaluation that a plan is ’90 percent ready,’ the two sides seem to be moving no closer together. In negotiating, the Ukrainian and European sides may be hoping to highlight that it is Russia that is saying no. And there is plenty in — and not in — their latest position that Russia will say no to. But, incoherently, Europe seems to have negotiated itself into a corner from which Russia doesn’t have to be the one to say no because Europe will.” (01/16/26)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/russia-wont-have-to-say-no-europe-will/
- In what world would Trump’s oil play actually help Venezuelans?
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Francisco Rodriguez“‘We’re going to run the country,’ President Trump said regarding Venezuela at a press conference just hours after Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s capture in a U.S. military raid in Caracas. To do so, the Trump administration has begun taking charge of Venezuelan oil shipments and selling them directly in international oil markets. The U.S. plans to make sure that these revenues are used only to buy imports from American companies. Whether this will at some point transform into a net benefit for the Venezuelan people depends on the granular details of the plan, which currently we know little about. The broader outlines of the vision are of course enough to make the blood of any Latin American nationalist boil.” (01/16/26)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/trump-oil-industry-venezuela/
- Unattended Baggage, episode 325
Source: Unattended Baggage
“Struggling with senility and battling tri-polarism.” (01/17/26)
https://unattendedbaggage.substack.com/p/episode-325-struggling-with-senility
- The Good Fight, 01/17/26
Source: Yascha Mounk
“Ian Bassin on How to Save American Democracy from Trump.” (01/17/26)
https://writing.yaschamounk.com/p/ian-bassin-on-how-to-save-american
- Bulwark Takes, 01/16/26
Source: The Bulwark
“Tim Miller takes on the rough stretch for Trump as leaked internal polling shows his immigration tactics backfiring, ugly ICE footage sparks public backlash, and even the White House admits the optics are hurting them.” (01/16/26)
- The Kyle Anzalone Show, 01/16/26
Source: Libertarian Institute
“Matt Wolfson: Israeli Connection to Maduro Kidnapping/ Will Zionists Get Their War With Iran?” (01/16/26)
- Serious Trouble, 01/16/26
Source: Serious Trouble
“You Are Not Jay Powell.” (01/16/26)
- The Tom Woods Show, episode 2727
Source: The Tom Woods Show
“Scott Horton on Iran Regime Change Propaganda.” (01/16/26)
https://tomwoods.com/ep-2727-scott-horton-on-iran-regime-change-propaganda/
- The Daily Blast With Greg Sargent, 01/16/26
Source: The New Republic
“Trump Press Sec Erupts in Fury at Media Over ICE as Polls Spiral Again.” (01/16/26)
https://newrepublic.com/article/205364/trump-press-sec-erupts-fury-media-ice-polls-spiral
- Politicks, 01/16/26
Source: Lions of Liberty
“Krassenstein vs Physics, Starmer vs Democracy and Trump vs Insurance Companies.” (01/16/26)
- Rising, 01/16/26
Source: The Hill
“Lindsey Granger gives her lens on the ongoing turmoil in Minnesota, with Governor Tim Walz asking President Trump to, ‘turn the temperature down,’ after Trump threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act in the state.” (01/16/26)
https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/5692625-rising-january-16-2026/
- Antiwar News with Dave DeCamp, 01/16/26
Source: Antiwar.com
“US Surging Military Assets to Middle East, Israel Kills at Least 10 Palestinians in Gaza, and More.” (01/16/26)